Taylor Pendrith and Garrett Rank have played countless rounds of golf together through the years, both at the junior level and now as members of the prestigious Team Canada development program.

But the round they will play together Saturday at Monroe Golf Club will be a bit unique because, as co-leaders after 54 holes of the Monroe Invitational Championship, a pretty important amateur title will be on the line.

"It should be exciting tomorrow," said Pendrith, who shot a third-round, 4-under-par 66 to grab a share of the lead at 10-under 200 with Rank, who had a 68. "It will be a comfortable pairing, almost like a casual round. We'll play for bragging rights."

Rank, who held the second-round lead at 8-under, agreed with Pendrith and said, "It'll be a lot of fun. We've played a lot of golf together."

The Team Canada program was started in 2003 with the stated goal of identifying the most talented amateurs in the country and helping them to achieve their goal of becoming successful professionals.

"They found that we don't have that many people on the PGA Tour so they were trying to identify some of us who have talent and put us with the same coaches, in some of the same events, so ultimately Canada might have more players on the Tour in years to come," said Rank.

The other three members of the men's national team are also playing at Monroe — Adam Svenssen, Corey Conners, and Chris Hemmerich. Hemmerlich is tied for sixth at 6-under 204 in a group that also includes Rochester's Trevor Sluman; Svensson is tied for 10th at 5-under 205; and Conners, a teammate of Pendrith's at Kent State, is tied for 14th at 4-under 206.

"We'll probably play five or six events together this summer," said Rank. "We travel together, stay together, and we're all good friends."

However, they also want to beat each other, too.

Pendrith, who tied for seventh last year at the MIC, had quite a round Friday. He made eight birdies and four bogeys on greens that are finally starting to speed up.

"The greens are getting faster throughout the week," said Pendrith. "Not as fast as they've been in the past, but that's been a problem everywhere up here. The greens are softer and you can attack them. It's easier to hit it close this year than it was in previous years because the greens aren't as firm as they were."

Pendrith opened with a bogey at No. 1, then began a birdie barrage as he circled numbers at 2, 3, 4 and 6. After a bogey at 8, he birdied 10, 12, 15 and 17, while bogeying 13 and 16. "My putter was good, I made a lot of nice 8-, 10-, 12-footers, and didn't make too many mistakes. I only missed the green four times and those were my only four bogeys."

Rank was even for the day until he made a double-bogey at the par-5 ninth, but regrouped on the back nine with a birdie at 12 before reeling off birdies on the last three holes to pull even with Pendrith.

Besides Sluman, the only local player with a chance is Pittsford's Gavin Hall, who shot a 70 and is tied for 14th at 206.